Directions:
After reading each paragraph, identify the primary pattern organizing the passage. Hit the Submit button when you are done. You will receive a score and find explanations in boxes to the right of the choices.

1.

Want to know how important nurses are to health care? Then consider these statistics. A 2002 nationwide study found that patient complications increased every time a nurse had to increase the normal patient load by one single person. Mortality also rose by 7 per cent. In a similar study, University of Utah researcher Susan Horn found that a nursing staff decrease forced convalescent-home nurses to spend less than fifteen minutes per day with their patients. What was the result? The incidence of bed sores, falls, and infections quickly began to climb. When more nurses were hired, time spent with patients increased to thirty or forty minutes per day, and patient outcomes improved dramatically. As these statistics suggest, nurses are the heart and soul of hospital and nursing-home care. Yet the nursing shortage continues to grow as trained nurses suffer from burn-out, and nursing schools turn away new applicants due to a lack of adequate funding. The fewer nurses tending the sick the more complications and deaths will continue to rise. The American public and its representatives need to take heed and do something about the dangerous problem currently haunting U.S. health care, or we will all suffer the consequences. (Source of information: Anne Underwood. "Diagnosis: Not Enough Nurses." Newsweek, December 12, 2005, p.80)

Primary Pattern:

a. Definition

b. Time order: process

c. Time order: dates and events

d. Cause and effect

e. Comparison and contrast

f. Classification

2.

Why is it that men and women differ when it comes to sexual attraction? Some researchers believe that a small, almond-shaped organ in the brain, the amygdala, is one reason why men seem to respond strongly to physical appearance whereas women more readily take into account characteristics like humor, intelligence, and self confidence. Scientists have found that the amygdala has strong connections to the visual system in humans. They have also discovered that the amygdala in men is more active than that of women during erotic arousal. Other researchers, however, claim that the differences in sexual attraction are more cultural than biological. Because women think they should care about the whole person rather than the external appearance, thats what they report. Some evidence for this claim can be found in research done by Dr. Meredith Chivers. Studying the sexual responses of females, Dr. Chivers found that women sometimes said they felt no sexual arousal while looking at pictures despite the fact that the machines monitoring their physical responses contradicted their statements. Much like men, the women did, in fact, seem to be excited by visual stimuli. (Source of Information: Anahad O Connor. "In Sex, Brain Studies Show, la Difference Still Holds." New York Times, March 16, 2004, p.F5)

Primary Pattern:

a. Definition

b. Time order: process

c. Time order: dates and events

d. Cause and effect

e. Comparison and contrast

f. Classification

3.

The notion of the "third-person effect" was first expressed by researcher W. P. Davidson in the journal Public Opinion Quarterly. According to Davidson, people generally underestimate the effects of the media on themselves. They are far more concerned about the medias impact on others. The assumption is that "other people" will be negatively affected or influenced by pornography, music lyrics, and television violence. This worry about the medias effect on others is often the basis for imposing censorship. In other words, those favoring censorship usually think it would benefit others. They assume that they themselves could not be so easily influenced. (Adapted from Christopher Harper. The New Mass Media. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002, p.317)

Primary Pattern:

a. Definition

b. Time order: process

c. Time order: dates and events

d. Cause and effect

e. Comparison and contrast

f. Classification

4.

During the first half of the nineteenth century, Mexico was engaged in almost continual warfare to protect both its independence and its boundaries. In 1829, Mexican forces fought off an attempted Spanish invasion. By the 1830s, it was embroiled in another battle. This time, the fight was with the United States over the territory of Texas, which then belonged to Mexico. Initially the Mexican government had encouraged Americans to settle in Texas. But by 1835, American Texans outnumbered Mexican nationals by four to one and were challenging the Mexican prohibition against slavery. After a brief battle, Texas won its independence in 1836. In 1845, war broke out between the two countries again when the U.S. made Texas a state. American forces captured Mexico City. By 1848, the American forces were in charge and the American government imposed a harsh treaty forcing Mexico to cede, or give up, huge portions of land that included what is now New Mexico, Arizona, and California. Mexico had barely recovered from the bruising battle with the U.S. when the French invaded Mexico in 1862, using the excuse of unpaid Mexican debts. Victorious at first, the French briefly installed a puppet government, and Mexican president Benito Juarez was forced to flee. Juarez, however, organized an effective resistance to French rule. By 1867, French forces had been driven out of Mexico.

Primary Pattern:

a. Definition

b. Time order: process

c. Time order: dates and events

d. Cause and effect

e. Comparison and contrast

f. Classification

5.

There are three principal types of non-volcanic mountains, or mountains not produced by volcanoes. Fold-and-thrust mountains develop when continental plates, the moving slabs that underlie the earths surface, collide against one another. Typically fold-and-thrust mountains are among the tallest. Fold-and-thrust systems include the European Alps, the Indian Himalayas and the American Rockies. Fault-block mountains form where tensions and stresses have fractured the Earths crust into high tilted ranges. These formations can be seen in the western part of the United States between the Sierra Nevada and Rock Mountain ranges. Upwarped mountains form when the Earths crust becomes slightly bent into broad regional uplifts. Erosion then does its work, leaving behind a rugged core of rocks that stand high above the surrounding terrain, or land. The Adirondack Mountains of northern New York may have formed, in part at least, from the process of upwarping.